**A Scotsman Non-Fiction Book of the Year** Vanessa Able wanted a truly independent Indian adventure, but nothing prepared her for the noise, chaos and terror of driving 10,000 km around the subcontinent or for finding the love of her life. Behind the wheel of a yellow Tata Nano (the world s cheapest car), Vanessa steers the reader through a hilarious, high-octane adventure. Taking any help she can get from loopy spiritual gurus to professional driving instructors, and even a divine insura...

Mumbai, mystery and a baby elephant combine in a charming, joyful cosy crime for fans of Janice Hallett, Alexander McCall Smith and Richard Osman.On the day he retires, Inspector Ashwin Chopra discovers that he has inherited an elephant: an unlikely gift that could not be more inconvenient. For Chopra has one last case to solve...But as his murder investigation leads him across Mumbai - from its richest mansions to its murky underworld - he quickly discover...

In a house on a suburban street in Nagasaki, meteorologist Shimura Kobo lives quietly on his own. Or so he believes.Food begins to go missing. Perturbed by this threat to his orderly life, Shimura sets up a webcam to monitor his home.But though eager to identify his intruder, is Shimura really prepared for what the camera will reveal?Based on real-life events, this prize-winning novel is a moving tale of alienation in the modern world.

How far would you go to change your life?Sharell Cook is 30 years old and living a privileged life in Melbourne's wealthy suburbs. She has it all: the childhood-sweetheart husband, the high-powered job and plenty of cash to splash.And it's not destined to last. In a dramatic turn of events, Sharell's marriage breaks down and her perfect life falls apart. Sharell opts for a complete change of scene, travelling to India to do volunteer work.But reinventing herself is ...

'Crackles and sparks with life like an exploding box of Diwali fireworks' -William Dalrymple**'**One can only envy Monisha Rajesh as she embarks on this epic journey' -Tim ParksWhen she was a child, Monisha Rajesh's family uprooted to Madras in the hope of making India their home, but soon returned to England with a bitter taste in their mouths. Two decades on, Monisha turns to a map of the Indian Railways and takes a page out of Jules Vern...

A tremendous first novel from an exciting young author.Feted for its electric chaos, the city of Bombay also accommodates pockets of calm. In one such enclave, Mohan, a middle-aged letter writer – the last of a dying profession – sits under a banyan tree in Fort, furnishing missives for village migrants, disenchanted lovers, and when pickings are slim, filling in money order forms. But Mohan's true passion is collecting second-hand books; he's particularly attached to novels with m...

The future is here. India has just sent its first spacecraft to the moon, and the placid city of Mysore is gearing up for its own global recognition with the construction of HeritageLand - Asia's largest theme park. From behind the formidable gates of Mahalakshmi Gardens to the shanty houses on the edge of town, the people of Mysore are abuzz as they watch their city prepare for a complete transformation. Susheela, an elderly widow, is forced into a secretive new life. Uma, trying to escap...

Irreverent, laugh-out-loud tales of living and travelling in India.

It's not easy landing unprepared in a country like Japan. The eccentricities of the calendar, the indecipherable postal system, not to mention the alien alphabet, language and culture, have all to be confronted before the disorientated traveller can feel at ease. Trying to ride a bicycle through the streets of one of the most congested cities in the world would seem to compound your problems. For Josie Dew, however, with over 200,000 miles already clocked up in the saddle few things could ...

A muscular, deeply incisive and deathly funny comment on twenty-first century India, The Story of My Assassins is a multi-layered novel that skilfully slashes through the subcontinent's dubious spiritual serenity to lay bare every crippling divide of language, wealth and class. Trawling life and death in the dark underside, it inquires into the inexorable codes of power and wealth that propel societies. A triumph of disparate voices, unbearable realities, and impossible conundrums, this is...

Where innocence, deceit and love collideAnand is a Bangalore success story: successful, well-married, rich. At least, that's how he appears. But if his little factory is to grow, he needs land and money and, in the New India, neither of these is easy to find.Kamala, Anand's family's maid, lives perilously close to the edge of disaster. She and her clever teenage son have almost nothing, and their small hopes for self-betterment depend on the contentment of Anand's wife: a w...

A young man returns home to Delhi after several years abroad and resumes his place among the city's cosmopolitan elite - a world of fashion designers, media moguls and the idle rich. But everything around him has changed - new roads, new restaurants, new money, new crime - everything, that is, except for the people, who are the same, only maybe slightly worse.Then he meets Aakash, a charismatic and unpredictable young man on the make, who introduces him to the squalid underside of ...